The Hand that Feeds
by MissMatriarch
Summary: Separated from the rest of his group, Jaune Arc gets his hand bitten by a mysterious and unknown type of Grimm. Following are disastrous changes in his life and the endangerment of his friends and beloved. When the bitten becomes the biter, no one is safe. [Chapter 2: A Phrase I Can't Escape From]
1. It Looked So Cute

**The Hand that Feeds**

**Chapter 1: **

**It Looked So Cute**

* * *

It felt like he had passed the same tree for the seventh time now.

He'd never truly realized just how big the forest was before now, but his feet felt heavy, heavier than stone as he dragged them along in a steady, tireless pace, each step claiming more and more of the blonde's energy.

Jaune rubbed the back of his neck with an exhausted sigh, beads of sweat forming on the surface of his skin and his aching muscles crying out for a break. It was an extremely hot summer day in the Emerald Forest, the sunlight filtering down through the leaves overhead and drenching the ground below in a warm, hazy light. Unfortunately for Jaune, the heat was quickly taking its toll. It seemed that with each passing minute, the temperature was rising, and his vision grew more and more clouded by heat-infused fatigue.

To make matters worse, he was lost, separated from the rest of his team by the towering trees of Emerald Forest. By now they'd probably completed their "Search and Destroy" mission.. It was a bitter pill to swallow that his team were just as effective without him. Maybe even more effective. A strong sense of self-loathing rose in the back of his mind. What kind of leader would lose their group, and become lost in the forest on top of that?

When he and the rest of his team were initially assigned a Search and Destroy mission, Jaune was less than thrilled. It meant he would have to face more battles with hordes of Grimm, something he wasn't very good at. In times like these, where strength and skill were the key to success, Jaune felt insufficient. He wasn't wild and untamed like Nora, calm and collected like Ren, or skilled and agile like Pyrrha. He was the simple, clumsy and soft-centered boy raised and taught from inner Mistral, who had forged his way into one of the top tier academies of the world. He was just… Jaune.

But despite all these setbacks, Jaune tried to keep his head up. As a team leader, he didn't have much of a choice anyway. He needed to be THE rock and guidance for his team to follow, even if his fighting skills weren't nearly as accomplished as the rest of team JNPR.

And apparently, his sense of direction also wasn't quite as accurate as he remembered it to be.

He pushed aside a branch that was in his path, stumbling slightly over roots hidden beneath a carpet of leaves. Jaune let go of the branch, only to see it spring back straight towards him, striking him across the cheek and sending him tumbling to the ground. He let out an audible grunt as his rear collided with the hard solid ground, knocking the air out of him.

With a frustrated sigh, he wiped away the trickle of blood that was now flowing down his cheek. Finding the remainder of his team was proving to be a far greater challenge than he had originally thought. It was his own fault however. When their mission was interrupted by a small pack of deathstalkers hunting for prey, Jaune had decided in the heat of the moment that hanging on to the stinging barb of one of his foes would be the easiest way to bring it down. Needless to say, it was not. He should've known better, given that the exact same thing had happened on their very first trial into this forest.

The trials were designed to test the skill and coordination of the new teams, tasking them with journeying into the forest and bringing back a series of relics to the principal of Beacon. In the process they would form partnerships and take down oncoming enemies in the process. It felt like yesterday to Jaune, yet it had been almost 2 years since he enrolled into the academy. He still remembered clearly; vivid images of him and Pyrrha being chased by a deathstalker on their very first mission together. Both his memory of that day, and the reality of today ended in the same experience however; being swung half a mile deeper into the forest by an irritated deathstalker.

When he crash-landed face-first into the dirt, his mind was foggy, no clue where he had been flung from. Crocea Mors, his beloved sword and shield were nowhere to be seen, leaving him completely defenseless in case of an attack. Jaune knew all too well how dangerous the denizens of Emerald Forest could be. On top of that, to complete the mission, they'd have to return their gear, for a hunter is no threat without his weaponry.

His train of thoughts was interrupted by the sound of a cry, piercing and treacherous. The excruciating high pitch wasn't like anything he had ever heard before. A moment later, Jaune's surroundings fell silent, the only sound audible over the silence was the gentle rustle of tree branches and birds chirping high above him.

Jaune retrieved his scroll from his pocket, hoping to have found some reception by now to contact his teammates. A very displeased sound escaped his lips as he looked upon what the earlier launch had done to his scroll. A large crack had formed on his screen from the bottom to the top, leaving him unable to activate the device. It was going to cost him a lot of card credit to repair it back to its original state.

Engulfed in his thoughts, Jaune failed to notice the dark storm clouds approaching from just above the treetops. Bad weather was closing in fast, limiting his time to get to safety drastically. He needed to hurry, retrieve his gear from a place he didn't know where it was, find his team and leave the forest before the storm would rage.

A hurried pace formed in his step as he made his way through the bushes, praying to the heavens that he was now walking in the right direction.

"C'mon.. c'mon." he mumbled to himself, his eyes rapidly moving for any sign of something familiar. He was drowning in a sea of trees as far as he could look, but it was no time to panic, with the sky overhead growing darker every second.

Then he heard it again. The same ear piercing shriek he had heard minutes ago. A chill ran down his spine as Jaune imagined the origin of these sounds. Predators? Grimm? It couldn't be, he would have recognised the sound if it was. Subconsciously, his pace turned into a slight sprint now.

Overhead, the dark clouds now masked every piece of blue sky that was there before. A thick, grey drape had been pulled over the horizon in an intimidatingly small amount of time.

"Pyrrha! Nora! Ren?" Jaune shouted, bringing his hands to his mouth to amplify the sound. No response. Shoot.

Pushing through another wave of bushes, Jaune's eyes fell upon a familiar object. A big smile plastered on his cheeks by the sight of his beloved weapon Crocea Mors. The shield was slightly damaged by the fall, but the rest seemed to be in perfect condition. To his relief, the sword was still sheathed inside the shield part of the weapon.

Reaching forward to pick his belongings off the ground, he froze as the shriek once again filled the silence, now sounding extremely close to where he was. The sound was immediately followed by a subtle rustling of the bushes, causing Jaune to jump back in fear while rushing himself into a defensive fighting stance. A stance that looked everything but intimidating.

The rustling stopped, and out of the bushes emerged a small creature. Jaune had a vast knowledge of mammals and reptiles that could be spotted in the forest, but he had never seen an animal that was anything like what was sitting before him. He wasn't even sure if it was an animal, or a harmless Grimm type. But on top of being strange and almost mythical, Jaune found it.. rather cute actually.

It had a lot of resemblance of a dog, somehow being logically mixed with a goat. The small creature had a coat of thick black furr, mixed with white vertical streaks, colored all the way to the tip of its wagging tail. A small, pinkish tongue hung over its lips, panting very softly like a dog. A pair of small, silver horns stuck out of its head, both tilting into another direction. Jaune was confused. It looked far too innocent to be a Grimm type, but he couldn't tell without a clear look at the eyes, that were being covered by a thick layer of bangs.

Cautiously, the animal limped forward, alerting Jaune of a possible injury. Just a few feet before the blonde, the animal collapsed to the ground with a small, muffled thump. However unsure of what this was, Jaune was now sure of an injury, and sure that this wouldn't survive without some aid to its paw.

"Hey little guy.. or girl." Jaune tilted his head in confusion. There wasn't a clear trait that determined the creature's gender, if they had any gender at all.

The creature looked up, then tried to get up but failed doing so, as it cried in pain at the movement. It sounded oddly familiar to the shriek he had heard a while ago, Jaune thought. Was a sound so intimidating and scary coming from this little and harmless animal?

"Oh no, don't do that.. you'll only injure yourself more." Jaune cautiously approached the beast, visibly frightened upon seeing a human lifeform for most likely the first time in its short life. Reluctantly, it stepped forward with small, awaiting, steps.

"Uh.. what do you eat?" Jaune questioned, tapping his index finger on his chin while searching for the right answer. It didn't appear as a predator, so meat was out of the question. That meant it was a herbivore. Finding food for a herbivore in a forest wouldn't be so hard, would it? A sudden rush washed over him as he had an idea, his hand swiftly moving to his pouch.

From his pocket he retrieved a handful of raspberries, a measure he had taken just in case he was going to be lost in the woods longer than he had predicted to be.

He reached out his hand in a slow mannerism, awaiting the animal's move. Tilting its head slightly in curiosity, the animal came closer, leaning in to where Jaune's hand was. Keeping its gaze strictly focused on Jaune, it carefully took a raspberry, and started to chew on it, first with a neutral expression, but later seemingly pleasured by its sweet taste.

Relief washed over the young blonde as the creature continued to munch on the contents of his pocket, first careful, but after a short while it turned greedy.

Jaune's other hand made contact with the soft fur of the animal, lightly ruffling it. It was quite unfortunate animals weren't allowed inside the Beacon dormitory, well except Zwei, but that was because he was basically a drooling and tail-wagging weapon, loved by professor Oobleck and other students, otherwise he might have considered taking this animal home.

"Aren't you adorable?" Jaune cooed playfully, lowering his hand carefully to where the wound was. Gently, he squeezed it. "Now let's s-"

His sentence was cut short by a series of manic shrieks, startling and nearly deafening Jaune. The creature turned hysterical as his eyes turned a blood colored shade of red through his bangs. It squirmed and fought, trying its best to escape from the hold Jaune had on it. Failing to do so, the animal turned aggressive, biting down hard into Jaune's palm. Taken back, Jaune rapidly let go of the creature, his hand tightly gripping his palm in a pained wheeze.

"Damnit!" He cursed, as blood gushed out his hand profoundly. Hadn't he endured enough blood loss today?

Meanwhile the animal fled in a hurry, the limp gone and the eyes remaining to glow a furious shade of red. It was unmistakably a Grimm, a type of which Jaune had never heard of or never encountered before. He saw the Grimm striding away with big jumps, blending in with the dark leaves and mud of the forest.

"Jaune!" A shout came from the distance, a soft and familiar voice calling out to him in slight panic, but he barely heard it. He felt like he was a stuck underwater, drowning. His vision was swimming before and his hearing was now extremely muffled, the sound of his heartbeat reverberating and throbbing in his eardrums.

"Jaune!" The same voice called out again, an increased panicked tone this time. But he was unable to speak. His mind was failing to get an understandable word out of his mouth.

In a haze and feeling wobbly, he looked down at his hand, trying his best to focus his vision, while his vision was swimming and dark splotches decorated his eyesight. A wave of bile hit the back of his throat at the uncertainty whether he was hallucinating or if the horror that was happening in front of him was a true one.

His hand had stopped bleeding, but the skin around the wound turned a shade almost similar to charcoal, small pieces of skin flaking off into thin clouds of black dust and spreading like a virus. His skin was.. rotting? A red glow throbbed from within his wound, brightening with every faint pulse of his heart. A burning sensation throbbed beneath the surface of his skin, a feeling that was excruciating.

"JAUNE!" A panicked scream, much closer now than it was before. But his vision and hearing had given up on him, making his entire body feel numb as his legs gave way beneath him, crashing his limp body on the ground.

His head fell back, faintly feeling the cool grass against the back of his scalp. His hand felt on fire, and smelt like rotten meat. Raindrops started to fall, a cool sensation against his burning forehead.

A silhouette filled the little dot of vision that remained, quickly followed by two other silhouettes. They looked frazzled and were pointing at his right hand in horror, shouting inaudible things at him, accompanied by the faint sound of thunder overhead.

He couldn't remember what was wrong with his hand. He couldn't remember anything.

Then it all faded to black.


	2. A Phrase I Can't Escape From

**The Hand that Feeds Chapter: 2**

**A Phrase I can't Escape From**

* * *

A steady and singular beeping, mixing in with the ticking of a nearby clock was all Pyrrha Nikos heard, her mind shutting out any noise of the conversation that was being held mere feet behind her.

Her gaze was fixated, deeply concentrated on what happened in front of her. A thick layer of glass separated her from the person she really wanted to be right with now. Jaune, held down on an operating table, with an arsenal of men standing around it, every single one of them wearing hazard suits for the unknown danger of his infection. Their voices were inaudible as the operating room was soundproof, but Pyrrha was sure of it; something terrible had manifested inside the blonde boy. He must have been terrified, experiencing this.

She sighed deeply, letting her head drop in her palms. It felt heavy from exhaustion, having sat there for the past 4 hours, watching the hazard group's every move on her team leader.

"_Jaune!" She remembered herself calling out to him, seeing the very familiar mop of blonde hair in the distance after their long search._

_However, he wasn't responding or even noticing her. Had he even heard her?_

"_Jaune!" She shouted again, but was greeted with the same lack of response. _

"_Hurry." She told Nora and Ren, closely following behind her as they made their way through the thick vegetation of the forest, creeping closer to where the boy was standing. She called out to him one last time._

_But suddenly, Jaune's legs gave way, and he collapsed to the ground. Pyrrha gasped, turning her walk into a sprint, uncaring of outsticking roots or anything else she could trip over. _

_Pushing her weight through the last bush, it became clear why the boy wasn't responsive. She was closely followed by her teammates, who quickly joined at her side, standing over their unconscious team leader._

_Nora gasped, pointing at his right arm with trembling voice. "W-What is that?" She looked at Ren expectantly and Pyrrha did the same. Ren was usually the person with this kind of knowledge, but he too seemed unable to find the correct answer._

"_I don't know, but it can't be anything good." He stated matter-of-fact, closely examining the boy's arm._

_The skin was quickly deteriorating, surrounding a set of holes dug in his skin, most possibly from a bite. It wasn't like anything Ren had seen before, treating the people of his hometown after a Grimm attack. "He was bitten by something, but I don't know what."_

_A black dust spewed from the wound, causing a startled Nora to lean in to her curiosity. "His hand.. it looks Grimm." Her hand inched closer, but she was quickly patted on her hand by a stern-looking Ren, indicating her to avoid contact with the wound._

"_Don't touch it. We don't know if it's contagious. We shouldn't even stand this close. The fumes coming from his wound could be toxic to us." _

"_Ren is right." Pyrrha agreed, shooting a worried look in Jaune's direction. "We should alert the emergency team at Beacon immediately. He might die if we don't help him fast." The last sentence was spoken with a sufficient amount of effort, trying to keep her emotions under control. With her leader incapacitated, she had to take charge in this situation, and a strong leader can't falter by their own emotion._

"_Nora, go back to the Academy, and be quick about it. Once you're there, alert the emergency team and professor Ozpin, he might know what is going on. Tell them we don't know what's going on, but we can't take Jaune to them, so they have to come here." She ordered, receiving a nod from the orange-haired girl in return. This was no time for caution as it could be a serious life-threatening situation. _

"_You got it boss." She boasted happily, making Pyrrha forget for a second in what grave situation they were. _

_Without further delay, Nora used Magnhild to launch herself above the treetops with a pleasured laugh, then proceeded to launch herself in the direction of the academy, leaving the scene._

"_Ren," Pyrrha looked at him sternly. "I need you to find who or what did this. Any sign that could lead us to the culprit will do." _

_He nodded, coming closer until he's standing right in front of Pyrrha. Reassuringly, he put his hand on her shoulder. _

"_Don't worry okay? He'll be fine. We're going to take him to Beacon where they know how to treat this." Ren soothed, always seeing through the mask Pyrrha held in front of her to hide her emotions. Sometimes she damned his perceptive skills. _

_He then vanished out of sight, closely examining the ground for a pattern or footprints, leaving Pyrrha alone to accompany the blonde, in case he'd regain consciousness. _

"_I hope so." She muttered under her breath defeatedly._

Since then, Jaune still failed to regain his consciousness, but was at least, steadily breathing. The "infection" like the hazard group called it, was tamed, but only after a multiple of hours of hard, agonizing labor. The spreading stopped after the infection had reached just underneath his elbow.

It seemed as if the doctors were wrapping up their work. They all left the room, one last of them scribbling something on a notepad, before putting it down on a little table. Following his colleagues, they stepped through the decontaminating chamber and disappeared out of vision.

In the observational room, team RWBY had now joined the remainder of JNPR, getting an explanation of what events had unfolded by Nora, who as usual, exaggerated a lot in the plot of her storytelling.

"And then a whole fleet of airships landed in the forest, and I got to fly one!" Nora exclaimed excitedly, being stared down by a set of five disbelieving looks. "And that's how we got here!" She wrapped up her story with her fist, proudly bumped against her chest.

"Right.." Yang deadpanned, narrowing her eyebrows before turning to Ren. "So what's gonna happen to him?"

He shook his head dejectedly. "We don't know, we're waiting for the doctor-in-charge to fill us in."

As if they were speaking of the devil, a door opened and a tall figure stepped in the room.

Pyrrha's head shot up, her body following in a swift, effortless movement, completely ignoring her exhausted muscles calling for a quit.

She stopped her footing when she was standing right in front of him, her eyes lit with a sparkle of hope, awaiting an answer.

"Hello everyone, I'm doctor Silverbeck." He introduced himself. "I was in charge of the decontamination operation performed on your friend." The man spoke in a professional tone. His posture was tall and broad, and his voice unwavering. The light wrinkles that formed in his brow gave hint of him being a subtle fifty years old, maybe a tad older. His hair was colored jet black, greying ever so slightly above his ears. His face had some rather primal features, making him look a little less human. He was assumable a faunus, of the ape kind, Pyrrha suspected. Perhaps it was a gorilla.

'_Does this mean he has opposable thumbs on his feet?' _Pyrrha wondered for a second.

"How is he, doctor?" The redhead spoke in a soft voice, tender and obviously not ready for any bad news.

"He's out of critical condition, but we can't release him just yet." He raised his hand in Ren's direction. "Mr. Ren was right in his suspicions. Mr. Arc was indeed bitten by something, but we have so far failed to constatate what exactly bit him. We presume it's a Grimm type, given his hand has somehow grimmified, as my colleagues called it. There's no nerves, bone or blood remaining in Mr. Arc's right arm, this was an effect of the bite." The information made everyone's face morph in distaste.

"So how can we fix this?" Ruby spoke up, pointing at Jaune through the thick glass. She was unmistakably pointing at his arm, that was still a vast shade of black.

The doctor hesitated, before regaining his assured posture. "We.. can't."

At this, everyone gasped with concerned and horrified looks.

"At least, not until we know what bit him, but I talked with General James Ironwood, and he's sending out a recovery team in the morning. Unfortunately, until then we're unable to find a cure to counteract the damage done by this Grimm." The doctor adjusted his glasses and flipped a page on his notepad.

"Can we talk to him?" Pyrrha asked with concerned eyes, mirroring the rest of the group.

"It isn't safe to talk to him now miss Nikos. Although his condition isn't contagious in this stage, we're unsure of how this change has affected Mr. Arc's brain and abilities. We'll have to closely monitor his condition, and for safety measures we can't let others interfere with his behavioral changes. However, he'll be fit for release in approximately 2 weeks. You have nothing to worry about." He explained carefully, trying to reassure the group about their friend's wellbeing.

The teams looked at each other with mixed feelings, unsure how to react properly to the situation and whether to be relieved or concerned.

"You said 'not contagious in this stage', Dr. Silverbeck. Does this mean it'll be contagious in the future?" Blake questioned, the rest of the group nodding in agreement, apparently wondering the same question.

At this, the doctor appeared unsure. He scratched the side of his head before looking at the group of students with a hint of.. uncertainty.

But before he was able to speak, his sentence was cut short by a nurse, coming in through the door, looking for the mentioned doctor.

"Dr. Silverbeck? They need your assistance in operation room 3. A young man from the third year has severely injured his knee during a sparring match, and they need extra hands during the operation." She spoke in a monotone voice.

"I'll be right with you, Judy." He responded, turning his attention back to the students.

"I'm sorry children, but I can't stick around much longer. It's late, you should all head back to your dormitories and try and get some sleep. Mr. Arc is in safe hands with our safety team." The doctor tried to reassure the group. With saying a final "goodnight", he followed the nurse out of the room.

"He's right." Ruby yawned, shooting a glance at the clock. It was already long past eleven o'clock, and midnight was creeping closer. "We should go home. Zwei is probably starving by now, maybe he has started chewing on my study books."

She topped up that sentence with a grunt. "Ohh, I so hope he started chewing on my books. It'd be a great excuse to skip class." She giggled.

At this remark, Weiss rolled her eyes, as she dragged Ruby with her, out of the observational room with Yang and Blake in tow. Only the three remainders of team JNPR were left in the dark, empty room. The gloom that surrounded them was heavy, almost suffocating, as none of them found the courage to break the silence.

Pyrrha was tired, and they had classes planned tomorrow, but she didn't see the possibility of her being able to concentrate with her support and best friend gone, critically injured in the infirmary, with chances of him never being the same Jaune again. With audible effort, she swallowed away the lump that had formed in the back of her throat, trying her best to hold back the tears that formed in the corners of her eyes.

It felt like a piece of her had been crippled.

A large piece.

What the doctor said, it didn't add up to the red-haired girl. She had little knowledge of diseases and even less of contagious diseases, but this didn't seem harmless. The mere fact that a part of Jaune turned Grimm didn't seem like it was nothing to worry about. Pyrrha shook her head, her mind running into a thousand different directions, making up doom scenarios, but none of them had a happy end.

"Let's go." Ren's voice broke the silence. "We can't stay here." He mumbled faintly.

Without a single word spoken, they all left the Beacon infirmary, back to their dorm where they would be greeted with an empty bed, and it bothered all of them.

* * *

When Pyrrha woke up the next morning, the nightmare felt long from over. She woke up a few hours earlier, bathing in her sweat from yet another one of her nightly terrifying delusions. Disregarding her need for sleep, she continued to toss and turn until eventually, she did fall into a slumber, but only for a total of 2 hours throughout the entire night.

Sitting on the windowsill in the early morning, she observed the waves of students that were walking down below their dormitory. A throbbing headache had crept its way up her scalp, not surprising, given the little sleep she allowed herself to have. Looking into the rising sun only sharpened the pain, as she squinted her eyes in discomfort.

Studying was out of the question, with her concentration gone, along with her usually calm posture. Her appearance looked frazzled and messy, opposite to what she's used to with her strict daily routine of hygiene and perfection. Her silky hair hung loose over her shoulders in messy and unbrushed streaks and she wore a shirt that was a couple sizes too big for her. It belonged to Jaune, but she needed something to cling to for hope, something she could brush her fingers over.

Nora and Ren didn't sleep either that night, but remained enough of their composure to attend class, so they were getting ready.

Hearing the faint sound of footsteps, Pyrrha turned around in a rushed motion, struggling to keep her balance for a second. She gazed right into sky blue orbs. Nora was standing behind her, holding a hairbrush. Ren wasn't in the room anymore by now, as Nora told him to go up ahead, but Pyrrha was to absent-minded to notice.

"Let me handle it, 'kay?"

The girl sighed, slumping her shoulders and allowing herself to be seated on the bed, Nora flopping on the mattress right behind her, making a very disapproving noise as she readied her brush.

"Whooh, what on earth have you done to your hair woman? Geez." Nora laughed, earning a lighthearted chuckle from the other huntress.

With gentle strokes, she began brushing, humming ever so excitedly as she did so. Each stroke felt soothing and relaxing to the headache the redhead was enduring.

But after a while of sitting in comfortable silence together, Pyrrha decided to speak up.

"Nora?"

Nora looked up from brushing at the call of her name. "Yes Pyrrha?"

Pyrrha turned around, her gaze once again meeting Nora's. The orange-haired gave her a puzzling look at the unusual sight. The red-haired huntress' eyes looked tired, emotional, and almost void. Her voice sounded hoarse as she spoke. This wasn't the fearless and tactical huntress Nora was used to seeing.

"Do you think he's hurting?" There were tears welling up in Pyrrha's green orbs, a sight that could shatter hearts.

Despite the lack of mention of his name, Nora knew exactly who she was talking about. It was all they could think about, after all. Setting aside her usually reckless nature, Nora allowed her more caring and nurturing inner side to take lead, as she opened her arms, pulling Pyrrha into a tight embrace. This was exactly what she needed right now. They both did.

"I don't know, but they're trying everything they can." Nora spoke softly, trying not to overwhelm her partner, who already suffered enough in the last 24 hours.

At this, Pyrrha's shoulders started shuddering as she sobbed, allowing her mask to crumble in front of her teammate, who accepted her grief with gentle strokes on her back.

"I'm s-scared. What if he dies?" Pyrrha sobbed, tightening her grip on the other girls uniform.

Nora shushed her kindly, rocking her back and forth ever so slightly.

"Sshh. It'll be alright. He'll come back, I feel it."

Nora wished she was as confident in her mind as she was in her voice, but in reality she was skeptical of Jaune's return, being bitten by a creature no one even knew what it looked like except Jaune. But he had to come back, for the sake of everyone who loved him.

For the sake of Pyrrha, who grew desperate at the absence of a familiar blonde mop at her side in battle, at the cafeteria table and on the Beacon rooftops.

They sat there, silent for a few more minutes as Pyrrha continued to sob into Nora's shoulder, praying that the agonizing uncertainty would subside and be replaced by the breathing and goofy figure of their beloved friend.


End file.
